My new Hoosier

 I haven't been yard saleing in over a year and a half . But for some reason I wanted to go this weekend. There won't many out there, so we decided to go have breakfast after one last stop. While we were there we heard people taking about Willow Spring Road yard sale. My husband decided to try up in that area and that where we found my Hoosier. I believe if we hadn't heard them talking we would of just went to breakfast. This is one of the reasons I believe the Lord had a hand in my getting my dream of owning a Hoosier. The other is that I don't yard sale any longer because (1) My husband doesn't like to go, but he was all for it this time. (2) I have to much stuff already.  Everything worked in our favor. The Hoosier was in perfect condition, the price was fantastic and the lady was nice enough to take 300 in cash( that's all the bank machine would let us take out.) and 250 in a check. Most people don't take checks. It even fit perfectly between the two door in the den. I truly have the Lord to thank for my Hoosier. 

My favorite homemade brownies

I love these Brownies. These are definitely my favorite. If you like a fudge texture brownie these are not for you. They are not like a cake brownie either, they are somewhere in between.

• 1/2 cup melted butter
• 2 eggs whipped
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup white sugar 
• 1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon baking powder

• FROSTING
•   1 1/2tablespoons butter, softened
• 3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 tablespoon honey ( whipped if possible. Regular is ok )
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3/4cup confectioners' sugar 
• a dash of cinnamon  
  Mix your eggs, butter, and vanilla together in a small bowl.
   Mix sugar,flour,salt,coco,and baking powder together in a large bowl. Add your wet mix to your dry and stir just till combined. Don't over mix. Place in a greased and floured small baking pan. Bang on counter to even out batter. Bake at 350 for 25 to 30 minutes.
  
  
   Frosting:
  Mix your frosting ingredients together , add a little water till you get the frosting texture you like.( sometimes I like just a light glaze, other times I like a frosting. ) Frost the brownies while still warm. 
  I don't like a sweet frosting ,if you do make it with 3 tablespoons of butter and 1 cup powder sugar. 

Old Look in a new guest room.

 We turned my daughter's old room into a guest bedroom . It felt so good to be able to get a lot of my packed antiques out of the garage and find them a good home. I am so happy with the results.

 The fabric picture  was make for me at Christmas by my good friend Jackie. I painted a metal pipe and ceiling chandelier ring black to give the fake wood stove a more real feel.

 These are pictures of Rick's family members. The Madonna belonged to his Grandmother

  This is one of my favorite pictures of my girls.

 The stool is from a old school house. The handles made it easy for the teacher to move around the room helping students.

 Even though the rug was made by me ,I though it would work great with the bed.

I am so happy with the results. I love the way the room turned out.

Tea Towel Apron.

 This is the Tea Towel Apron I made for C J on our Farm Girl apron swap. I went to her sight on face book to get an ideal of what she would like. She had a lot of photos from their Glam Camping trip. Most of them showed vintage aprons and kitchen ware along with lase fabrics. so this seemed like a good choose. It was so easy and fun  to do. I see myself making more in the future.

 I added a rose needle work to the top just for something a little extra.

I also made a headband that she could wear with it,when she goes glam camping.

If you interested in making one just go to you tube and type in tea towel aprons in the search bar. They truly are fast and fun.

A wonderful Surprise from a blogger friend

I got a great surprise  from Kristina http://pioneerwomanatheart.blogspot.com/

She sent me a lovely letter and book. I really enjoyed reading her letter. Now days letter writing has almost become a lost art. The book is titled Promise land. It is a moving pioneer saga that tells the story and courage of three woman trying to make it during this time period. I will be enjoying it this evening with a good cup of coffee.  I have written her a letter back. I forgot how nice it was just to set down and write a letter.
 Even with cell phones, people really don't communicate anymore. It's all about short texts. We are all guilty of this. I only know of two friends that actually talk on the phone the rest text.   We are slowly learning how not to interact with others. Which is truly sad. Kristina thank you not only for the book, but for opening my eyes  to the joy of letter writing again.

Sourdough Bread and Starter recipe

My husband loves this bread. There are two ways to make this bread, the original or modern way. I will show you both ways. This loaf was made with the modern way.

 These ingredients will be this same in each method except that you will add 2 and 1/2 tsp of yeast to the modern version.

 2 cups starter at room temp                            2 tbsp oil                          
 1 cup warm water ( Not Hot )                         4 cups bread flour                                                  
2 tbsp sugar                                                       1 tsp salt
2 tbsp buttermilk powder
 In your kitchen aid mixing bowl add your starter ,sugar,buttermilk powder , oil,and water together. . If you are doing the modern method add your yeast at this time. Add salt to your flour (  add your flour one cup at a time as you are mixing your dough using the bread hook . After you have added all the flour  knead for a 5 min. Come back and check it to see if the dough needs more flour or water.( Everything should be worked away from the bowl and clinging to the hook.) If the weather is dry you may need more water. If it is wet you may need more flour. If you have to add either do it a little at a time. I use a tbsp  at a time . Then wait to let it combine before adding more. After the dough has pulled away from the bowl let it knead for 10 minutes. this will make a big different in the texture of the bread. You want your bread to be elastic and smooth to the touch. It should be rolling freely around the hook.

For the original method : place your dough in a greased bowl,cover and leave in the oven with the light on over night or at least 8 hours . It has to at least doubled before it is ready for the next step. Then take out your dough punch down and shape into a round loaf or any shape you like, transfer it to a baking sheet sprinkled with corn meal. Dust the top with flour put back in oven  covered to rise 2 hours or till doubled. I always check my dough after an hour. It doesn't always take 2 hours. Preheat oven to 375 Add a pan of water to the bottom of your oven when you put in your bread to bake this will produce steam. Cook for 30 to 35 minutes. Bottom of bread should sound hollow when you tap the bottom of it. That's how you know it's done.

For the modern method: It is the same except you let it rise only for an hour the first time or till doubled. Then 45 minutes the second time or till double everything else is the same.

Hope you enjoy this bread as much as I do.

SOURDOUGH STARTER:
you will need 2 quart glass container ( I use a 2 quart canning jar)

Cheese cloth and something to secure it with. ( I buy a grease catcher screen and cut it down to fit inside a canning jar lid.)
Long metal spoon
flour
Fruit juice or beer ( I really like the beer starter.and no it doesn't taste like beer.)
filtered water
Day 1 : Mix 1 cup flour with one cup beer or fruit juice in your container. Stir till well combined.It should look like pancake batter. Add more liquid if you need to, stir again before you go to bed. Place in a warm spot.
Day 2: don't add anything just stir every 8 hours. (I stir mine once in the morning ,once in the afternoon and before I go to bed)
Day 3: add 1/2 cup flour and fruit juice or beer Stir till combined stir, every 8 hours.
Day 4: add 1/2 flour and 1/2 FILTERED WATER Stir till well combined, stir every 8 hours.
Day 5 : add 1 cup flour and 1 cup Filtered Water Stir till well combined, stir every 8 hours.
Day 6 : add 1/2 cup water and 1/2 cup Filtered Water Stir till well combined, stir every 8 hours.
Your sourdough is ready to use. You should start seeing bubbles around the 4 day. Plus it should have risen in the jar if not add just a pinch of yeast. No more then that or you will have a mess. Please wait till at least the four day to do this. One day It may look like nothing is happening ,then the next it is half way up your container.

If you use your sour dough you must feed it. If you take a cup add 1 cup flour and one cup water to replace it. You can keep your sourdough in the frig as long as you feed it once a week. Take out 1/2 a cup then add 1/2 cup flour and 1/2 water. This will keep it healthy.

Dutch Apple Cake

Before I start typing out the recipe I have to do a disclaimer. This is a borrowed picture of the cake. Mine was eaten before I could get a decent picture of it. The recipe is from Taste of home with a few of my added tweaks throw in. I also add a glaze that put it over the top.  If you have never tried any of the Taste of home recipes,give them a try.  Any way, enough of my babbling. I will get on with the recipe.

3 med tart apples, peeled and cut into 1/4 in slices
3 tbsp of sugar for apples
1 cup sugar for cake
1 tsp cinnamon
2/3 cup softened butter
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups all purpose flour
1/8 tsp salt
In a large bowl combine apples with 3 tbsp of sugar and the cinnamon. Let sit on counter for one hour.
In a large mixing bowl mix the butter and 1 cup sugar together till creamy. Add the eggs one at a time then add your vanilla. Mix your salt into your flour then add to the butter mixture, Stir together. Add your apples along with 2 tsp of the juice from the bowl stir together well. Place in a greased bread pan and bake at 300 degrees for an hour and a half or till a toothpick comes out clean. Cool for 10 minute before taking out of pan. Serve warm
Glaze :
1 cup powdered sugar
apple pie spice seasoning
milk
Pour enough milk into your powdered sugar to make it the consistence of syrup. Sprinkle in your apple spice seasoning a little at a time till you get the flavor you like. I used about 1/4 to 1/2 a tsp. You can pour it over the warm cake or  cut the cake in slices and pour over each slice. I poured  it over the top of the cake. But the glaze was so good that next time I am pouring it over the cut slices.

Note: It smelled so good that we didn't wait the 10 minutes. The warm cake with the melted glaze was so good! It did try to fall apart a little when we cut it. But so worth it. After one time of making this it has become a family favorite.

My world of Aprons.

This chicken apron is one my dear friend Debbie helped me make.  I quilt but have never worked with a clothes pattern before. She felt an apron was a good start. I love the big pockets for clothes pins.. I learned so much from her in just one day. She is one great seamstress on top of being a great teacher especially with me as a student.

 

 This is the apron Heidi  http://mysimplecountryliving.blogspot.com/ made me one year for Christmas as you can see from the picture below it is reversible. Sorry it is so wrinkled I had to get it out of the dyer to take a picture of it since I wear it a lot.

 This is the first apron Dollyhttp://dollysdesigns.blogspot.com/ made for me. This is another one that is worn a lot.

 I love this apron so much. Dolly also made this one for me. What was great about this one I was able to custom make it for my taste. She  took my favorite colors and then gave me choice of fabric and accessories . I don't wear it a lot for fear of messing it up.  But I love looking at it.

 This is my husbands apron for grilling. Which I steal from time to time.

 Dollar store apron. I use it for painting since it is plastic, it's easy to wipe paint off of it.

 Another dollar store apron . I just liked the snowman.

Ok, Now we are at my all time favorite! I love that it is vintage but most of all it has cats! Any one who knows me well knows my husband is keeping me from being the crazy cat lady. I keep this put up with my Christmas stuff because if not I would wear it all year long and wear it out.

 
 Heidi from http://mysimplecountryliving.blogspot.com/
is doing a apron hop where you can show off your aprons. Check it out, there are a lot of apron posts to see.  If you have aprons you would like to share head on over to Heidi's Apron Hop. The more the merrier.  http://mysimplecountryliving.blogspot.com/2014/03/grab-your-apron-blog-hop.html

Time to make the sausage

They had pork shoulder roast on sale for a dollar a pound.I couldn't pass that up. I was able to get good size roast out of it, 3 pounds of ground sausage and 2 pounds of breakfast sausage patties. Not to mention two packages of pork chunks for a stew. I love when I find deals like that.

   My version of homemade  breakfast sausage
2 pounds ground pork shoulder
1 teaspoon sage
1 teaspoon Italian seasoning.
4 pinches of brown sugar. ( if you like a sweet breakfast sausage add more )

1/8 of a teaspoon of my season mix. ( equal parts salt , pepper, and garlic powder mix together.)
Cook a sample patty.
Place plastic wrap over the bowl and place in fridge over night.( this is a must)

I recommend making a sample patty to see if you would like more of any of the ingredients. The amount of seasoning is totally up to your taste. The ingredients will blend together as it sits over night in the fridge.

Rag rugs have taken over.

 I have gotten so hooked on making these rugs. This is the fabric for Heidi's rug I am making for her Birthday. It's a late birthday gift, but then she knows how forgetful I am. She wanted a red ,white ,and black rug for her kitchen . She also wanted a little purple in it but I couldn't find a fabric that worked.  I bought most of it from Wal-Mart since it doesn't have to be a good quality . At 12 dollars a yard at the quilt stores, 3 dollars a yard sounds so much better. Especially since it takes about 10 to 15 yards for a standard rug. I got 20 yards since I wanted it a little bigger. The great thing about this craft is you don't have to buy fabric  you can use old sheets or clothing which you cut it into 2 inch strips.

 This has to be my favorite print.

This one is finished and beside my bed. I did have to fight with a cat to get it done since she felt it was a great place to sleep. I still have to look out for her in the morning when I get up.

The last of my twins has moved out.

Both of my twins are officially moved out today. They moved into a house together.We spent most of the day helping pack and unpack boxes. Rick pick up a washer and dryer for them while Tiff and I went shopping for little things that they still needed. When we got back I walked upstairs as soon as I saw Tiff's empty room I knew I wasn't ready for this. I walk right back down stairs and asked Rick to take me out for dinner or coffee I didn't care which . I just had to leave for a little while more. We are home now but I am antsy as all get out. Don't get me wrong I am very proud of them. At 22 they are working and living on they own,paying they own bills. But it's still hard. One bright spot was the girls found ways to keep us there a little longer after things were unpacked. It let me know They would miss us as much as we will miss them.

Homemade Air Conditioner DIY - The "5 Gallon Bucket" Air Cooler! DIY- ca...

This is so cool that I had to share it. The liner is a Styrofoam. Rick wants to try it just to see if it works. It would be great in the barn for the animals. Not to mention a bedroom.With the solar panel it would really save money especial here in California.